Neil attempts to cook the whole of Jane Grigson's 'English Food', and adds his own recipes on the way...

Friday, March 11, 2016

#418 Snipe

Sometimes…walking home across a boggy area
where heather gave way to rushes and reed grasses, I would be startled by an
eerie throbbing, bleating sound rising to a soft fluting crescendo…I have heard
it hundreds of times and it never ceases to make the hairs stir on the back of
my neck. This beautiful wind music is a cock snipe ‘drumming’…This hauntingly
lovely sound…is the first promise of spring.

Clarissa
Dickson Wright & Johnny Scott, The
Game Cookbook

The snipe is our smallest game bird, and
with its shy and secretive nature and dappled brown plumage, it is probably the
most difficult of the game birds to shoot. It is for this reason that you won’t
come across many of these unless you are a hunter or you know one very well. It’s
a good job that they are difficult to hunt because they are considered the most
delicious of the game birds! Conservation is always a priority with these indigenous
game species, but their elusiveness is almost self-managing, keeping a highly-fluctuating
population safe.

Sorry for the massive gap between posts
folks, but I’ve only gone and opened up a restaurant! News of this will follow
very soon. Needless to say, I’ve been pretty busy, but finally I’m writing up
some of my recipe backlog.

Recipes for redcurrant jelly can be found here
and a recipe for game chips makes up part of #122
Roast Pheasants, cooked many
moons ago

Woodcock and snipe are pretty much identical
except in size, so snipe too can be cooked with their innards or ‘trail’
intact. This is because they defecate when they take off for flight. The trail
can be scooped out at table and spread on the slice of toast the bird was
cooked on. You can, of course, remove the innards before you roast your snipe,
if this notion is repellent to you. I would encourage you to try it, as it is
delicious; like gamey Marmite. The heads are also left on, and sliced lengthways
so that the brain can be eaten.

It’s worth mentioning, however, the very
short hanging time required for birds eaten in this way – anything over 36
hours I find too gamey. I remember well once wretching over the kitchen sink
after eating a far too ripe woodcock; delicious gaminess merging into dead,
rotten animal all too quickly in these little birds. It’s a glamourous life I lead.

I managed to find some snipe this year at
my favourite butchers shop, WH Frost in Chorlton, Manchester. Unfortunately
their trails and heads had been removed so I couldn’t roast them in the
traditional manner.

I simply seasoned them inside and out and popped a tiny knob
of butter into their cavities and onto their breasts with a sprinkling of smoked paprika and roasted them for just
8 minutes at 230⁰C. I served them with some Morrocan-style buckwheat. Not very English, but there you go.

#418 Snipe.
Even though I couldn’t cook them in the traditional manner, they were still
very delicious birds. I expected them to be stronger in flavour compared to
woodcock, but they were actually more delicate. I can see why so many people
prize them above all others. Little did I know that when I cooked these, way
back in December, they would appear on my Valentine’s Day menu in February! If
you see some in your butcher’s shop, snap some up. 8/10.